Archangel35757

@@eezstreet -- yes, Assimilate is a GUI that wraps carcass... and sets everything up for carcass via the model.car file. But it could be that carcass is looking for texture file information in the dotXSI files... or Assimilate prepares this information. I'm not sure what information is written to the binary .carpet file or which app creates it. This binary file is written to a folder called "ravenlocal" in my root C:\ drive.

@@therfiles -- alternatively download the 3ds max 5 trial from the link I provided in the ROFF exporter thread. Then install the plugin for 3ds max 5 and follow the tutorial verbatim.

I posted an old, but good, ROFF tutorial in my WIP thread on making the ROFF2 Exporter in Coding and Scripting section... feel free to pull it out, expound on it, and add it to the tutorials section. @SzicoVII is suppose to be making a test map to help me beta test my new ROFF2 exporter to check that everything works (especially sounds/EFX).

All of that is set correctly in Assimilate. It generates the "model_default.skin" file-- however, it is empty ( 0 Kb ). It doesn't write the content. This is the mystery I'm trying to solve.

No... it's not possible to make plugins for GMAX because Autodesk never released SDK for it (you had to pay a handsome sum to get it). You can however, make MAXSCRIPT-based tools for GMAX.

What tools/plugins are they missing? (I'm not volunteering… just curious).

@@DT85, @@Psyk0Sith -- Ok... so I have the skeleton compiling with Carcass and creating the .GLM/.GLA. Assimilate can separately write out the animation config files. When I check to make a G2 .skin file... it only generate a blank file. I'm wondering where the .skin file failure occurs-- whether it's something missing or bad within the dotXSI file ( ...like texture paths??? We can have absolute, full paths or just the texture filename and extension ( ...the JKA files seem to be the latter type) ). Any ideas??? :unsure:

You can create ROFF files using Mr. Wonko's tools in Blender. However his scripts don't support playing sounds or efx yet... (maybe he will add those features soon). Hey, and Blender is free! Or like @@Circa said... download the 3dsMax educational version. Which is a 3 year license-- no limitations.

Due to lack of interest in this, and my ROFF2 exporter... I vote NO. If I knew how to close this poll or lock the thread... I would.

Alias you say??? I have demo's and learning editions of Alias Motionbuilder and Alias Studio on my 3D World magazine CD collection... let me load these up and check this .ASK format to see if they support it.

That must be a holdover from the older game tools... maybe can find some info in ST:EF, ST:Voy, or SoF2 tools about a .ASK file??? Probably just running down a rabbit hole.

Is there a NO ASK switch? Found this in code: TK_AS_CONVERTMDX_NOASK $aseanimconvertmdx_noask

Wouldn't the corresponding version of Carcass.exe that goes with the ST:Voyager SDK already support .ASE since it's supported by that version of Assimilate??? I've not tried those versions-- or the version that came with SoF2???

Well, assimilate shows .ase file type. Maybe you have to build it with Assimilate?

I'm not sure what the best course of action is... if anything. I was just thinking of recompiling Assimilate to add ROOT as enumerated, to eliminate "BAD:ROOT" warning (meaning it's not listed in anims.h). Edit: Also, some anim enumerated names have been recycled with all new/different animation... so that'd conflict with JO.

No, scores & scores were removed... do a side-by-side comparison using Notepad++. But I'm not sure if I should combine or not.

@@DT85 -- glad you got it sorted out... @@DT85, @@Psyk0Sith, @@minilogoguy18, @@eezstreet : Concerning Carcass.exe and Assimilate.exe. So I downloaded your GitHub submission for Assimilate and have it compiling-- I cleaned up the existing warnings. It appears that the version Raven released was 2.1 used by Jedi Outcast (and ST:Voyager). The mouseover help still states ST:Voy (Star Trek:Voyager). The one question I have and would like to know... it seems that Assimilate also supports the 3ds Max native .ASE animation file format. Has anyone attempted to compile a new animation using the .ASE format? That would be huge as well, if we could get that to work... as another alternative to dotXSI. I imagine you'd have to use the version of Carcass from JO as well. I looked at the version of Assimilate released for JKA and it states version 2.5 and setup for JK3. Not sure what they did differently inside the code-- except compile with the JKA anims.h file. I have an idea to combine the JO and JA anims.h file into one massive anims.h and recompile and see how it goes-- also adding "ROOT" to the enum list to eliminate the "BAD:ROOT" notification from Assimilate. Comments?

@@DT85 -- I have a similar code snippet getting the texture in my ROFF2 Exporter... using TSTR (not WSTR). But the 3dsMax SDK has methods to convert from WSTR/MSTR to TSTR. I'll post it tomorrow.

@@DT85 -- I pulled up a SoF2 model in Modview (they're a little wierd to work with... .skl files and all)... and you're correct. All of those extra facial bones are in the SoF2 skeleton.

Isn't that error complaining that you're trying to assign the address of a parameter to WStr when I think it's expecting a WStr* ???

@@DT85 and @@eezstreet -- My thinking regarding the facial bones is this: All of the bones in the JO root.xsi are (including the unused ones from SOF2) exactly what is needed for a detailed Hi-Def facial rig. The JO/JA bones (since they use the same eight bones) will be color coded differently from the SOF2 bones. The additional SOF2 facial bones will also be on a separate layer (so they can be hidden). The facial rig GUI will have controls for all of the bones-- I can make it where the unique SOF2 bones and controls have an option to be hidden-- for those folks who only want to skin their mesh to the JO/JA bones. Or you don't have to skin your face to any facial bones... (like most released JKA models today-- it's up to the user). But I plan to generate additional facial animations for the major phonemes/visemes (in addition to the standard JKA "TALK" anims)... My goal is to have some kind of lipsync system setup... that generates the rough first pass on lipsyncing.

@@DT85 -- So I need to color the unused facial bones another unique color... and put them on a unique layer. But I plan to use all of the facial bones in my rig.

@@DT85 -- Those facial bones are generated from the JO Kyle root.xsi, so wouldn't that mean that something has to be weighted to them? IIRC, the JO stormtrooper skeleton has the same bones is JA. I'll take a deeper look at the root.xsi files when I get home from work today.

@@DT85 -- Aren't all those facial bones used by JO? I intend to use all of them in my facial rig. You can hide the JO bones if you only want to work with JA or vice versa.

The nub_bones (or "_eff" bones), are used potentially for IK chains... they're also useful for position referencing for some control objects. In my opinion they also help show the end of the fingers. But I could easily put them on their own layer so they could be hidden. I'm debating whether to release just the skeleton-- or the skeleton as part of a simple IK rig... until my complex rig is finished.